Recording the phone conversation of a person without the latter’s knowledge – even if the two are husband and wife – amounts to a violation of the right to privacy under Article 21 of the Constitution, held by the Chhattisgarh High Court. The court said this while hearing a petition moved by a 38-year-old woman challenging the order of a family court in the Mahasamund district allowing her husband’s application in a maintenance case.

The 44-year-old man moved the family court seeking a re-examination of his wife on the ground that certain conversation was recorded on the mobile phone. He sought to cross-examine and confront her with the recorded conversation.

After the family court allowed the application in an order dated October 21, 2021, she approached the High Court in 2022 challenging it. According to her lawyer Vaibhav A. Goverdhan, the husband was trying to prove before the family court through the recorded conversation that his wife was committing adultery and hence he need not pay maintenance once they are divorced.